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Bueller has been botching investigations since the Anthrax Investigations
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TechRocks Offline
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Post: #1
Bueller has been botching investigations since the Anthrax Investigations
I do recall that one being a cluster-fark of epic proportions.

Quote:Under Mueller’s management, the FBI launched an investigation lasting ten years. They now brag about spending “hundreds of thousands of investigator hours on this case.” Let’s take a closer look at Mueller’s response to understand the context of the investigation — who his people investigated, targeted, and found guilty.

The anthrax letters began just a week after the 9/11 attack. While planning the airplane hijackings, Al-Qaeda had been weaponizing anthrax, setting up a lab in Afghanistan manned by Yazid Sufaat, the same man who housed two of the 9/11 hijackers. Two hijackers later sought medical help due to conditions consistent with infection via anthrax: Al Haznawi went to the emergency room for a skin lesion which he claimed was from “bumping into a suitcase,” and ringleader Mohamed Atta needed medicine for “skin irritation.” A team of bioterrorism experts from John Hopkins confirmed that anthrax was the most likely cause of the lesion. Meanwhile, the 9/11 hijackers were also trying to obtain crop-dusting airplanes.

http://thefederalist.com/2018/02/08/robe...x-attacks/
(This post was last modified: 03-19-2018 11:26 AM by TechRocks.)
03-19-2018 11:20 AM
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Post: #2
RE: Mueller has been botching investigation since the Anthrax Investigations
(03-19-2018 11:20 AM)TechRocks Wrote:  I do recall that one being a cluster-fark of epic proportions.
Quote:Under Mueller’s management, the FBI launched an investigation lasting ten years. They now brag about spending “hundreds of thousands of investigator hours on this case.” Let’s take a closer look at Mueller’s response to understand the context of the investigation — who his people investigated, targeted, and found guilty.
The anthrax letters began just a week after the 9/11 attack. While planning the airplane hijackings, Al-Qaeda had been weaponizing anthrax, setting up a lab in Afghanistan manned by Yazid Sufaat, the same man who housed two of the 9/11 hijackers. Two hijackers later sought medical help due to conditions consistent with infection via anthrax: Al Haznawi went to the emergency room for a skin lesion which he claimed was from “bumping into a suitcase,” and ringleader Mohamed Atta needed medicine for “skin irritation.” A team of bioterrorism experts from John Hopkins confirmed that anthrax was the most likely cause of the lesion. Meanwhile, the 9/11 hijackers were also trying to obtain crop-dusting airplanes.
http://thefederalist.com/2018/02/08/robe...x-attacks/

In fairness to Mueller, part of this "botching" is the separate silos approach to intelligence brought about by the infamous Gorelick memo. Not that the agencies needed any help in withholding information from each other. Information has been the holy grail of precious commodities in bureaucrat-land for decades. DHS was supposed to fix that. In fact, that is the only reason that I can come up to justify creating it as a separate cabinet-level agency to begin with.

What should happen is that CIA should take the lead outside the country and FBI should take the lead inside the country, and the two should share information. Instead, FBI now has an international division and CIA has a domestic division. And none of the four actually talk to each other, at least not as much as they should. I think we could learn a lot from the relationship of MI5 and MI6 to each other, and from the relationship of both to the UK foreign service.
03-19-2018 11:31 AM
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TechRocks Offline
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RE: Bueller has been botching investigations since the Anthrax Investigations
Quote:David Freed writes that Hatfill's story "provides a cautionary tale about how federal authorities, fueled by the general panic over terrorism, embraced conjecture and coincidence as evidence, and blindly pursued one suspect while the real anthrax killer roamed free for more than six years. Hatfill's experience is also the wrenching saga of how an American citizen who saw himself as a patriot came to be vilified and presumed guilty, as his country turned against him.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steven_Hatfill

Hmmm, where have we seen that before?
03-19-2018 11:33 AM
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Owl 69/70/75 Offline
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RE: Bueller has been botching investigations since the Anthrax Investigations
But here is where the water gets muddy. Conjecture and coincidence is the very nature of intel. It's a totally different approach from law enforcement. So when the two get muddled, you end up not knowing where things stand, because it's not possible to know.

Legal gray areas rhyme with witch. That's a lot of what was wrong in Iraq or Afghanistan. Did we have a declared war or not? Were the people we captured enemy combatants or civilians subject to US law enforcement and due process? To what extent were the Geneva Conventions which did not otherwise apply invoked by our government's decision to extent them unilaterally, and did such provisions survive the escape clause contained therein which says that if your enemy is not following them, then you don't have to either? Without knowing those things, it is impossible to know what behaviors are permitted and which are not. Bureaucrats love gray areas because they can come in after the fact and screw anybody they want to by applying 20/20 hindsight. For the 19-year old kid looking at a guy in a sheet and having about 4 microseconds to determine if he is friend on enemy, it's a vastly different proposition. Same for a law enforcement officer having roughly the same time to determine whether that black object in a suspect's hand is a gun or not.

Put people in never-never land, and then you can criticize and/or criminalize whatever they do. Bureaucrats love that, it's the stuff their lives are made for.
(This post was last modified: 03-19-2018 11:42 AM by Owl 69/70/75.)
03-19-2018 11:39 AM
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TechRocks Offline
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Post: #5
RE: Bueller has been botching investigations since the Anthrax Investigations
(03-19-2018 11:39 AM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  But here is where the water gets muddy. Conjecture and coincidence is the very nature of intel. It's a totally different approach from law enforcement. So when the two get muddled, you end up not knowing where things stand, because it's not possible to know.

Legal gray areas rhyme with witch. That's a lot of what was wrong in Iraq or Afghanistan. Did we have a declared war or not? Were the people we captured enemy combatants or civilians subject to US law enforcement and due process? To what extent were the Geneva Conventions which did not otherwise apply invoked by our government's decision to extent them unilaterally, and did such provisions survive the escape clause contained therein which says that if your enemy is not following them, then you don't have to either? Without knowing those things, it is impossible to know what behaviors are permitted and which are not. Bureaucrats love gray areas because they can come in after the fact and screw anybody they want to by applying 20/20 hindsight. For the 19-year old kid looking at a guy in a sheet and having about 4 microseconds to determine if he is friend on enemy, it's a vastly different proposition. Same for a law enforcement officer having roughly the same time to determine whether that black object in a suspect's hand is a gun or not.

Put people in never-never land, and then you can criticize and/or criminalize whatever they do. Bureaucrats love that, it's the stuff their lives are made for.

I'm trying to trash Bueller here, would you please stay on point.
03-19-2018 11:44 AM
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Post: #6
RE: Bueller has been botching investigations since the Anthrax Investigations
(03-19-2018 11:31 AM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  
(03-19-2018 11:20 AM)TechRocks Wrote:  I do recall that one being a cluster-fark of epic proportions.
Quote:Under Mueller’s management, the FBI launched an investigation lasting ten years. They now brag about spending “hundreds of thousands of investigator hours on this case.” Let’s take a closer look at Mueller’s response to understand the context of the investigation — who his people investigated, targeted, and found guilty.
The anthrax letters began just a week after the 9/11 attack. While planning the airplane hijackings, Al-Qaeda had been weaponizing anthrax, setting up a lab in Afghanistan manned by Yazid Sufaat, the same man who housed two of the 9/11 hijackers. Two hijackers later sought medical help due to conditions consistent with infection via anthrax: Al Haznawi went to the emergency room for a skin lesion which he claimed was from “bumping into a suitcase,” and ringleader Mohamed Atta needed medicine for “skin irritation.” A team of bioterrorism experts from John Hopkins confirmed that anthrax was the most likely cause of the lesion. Meanwhile, the 9/11 hijackers were also trying to obtain crop-dusting airplanes.
http://thefederalist.com/2018/02/08/robe...x-attacks/

In fairness to Mueller, part of this "botching" is the separate silos approach to intelligence brought about by the infamous Gorelick memo. Not that the agencies needed any help in withholding information from each other. Information has been the holy grail of precious commodities in bureaucrat-land for decades. DHS was supposed to fix that. In fact, that is the only reason that I can come up to justify creating it as a separate cabinet-level agency to begin with.

What should happen is that CIA should take the lead outside the country and FBI should take the lead inside the country, and the two should share information. Instead, FBI now has an international division and CIA has a domestic division. And none of the four actually talk to each other, at least not as much as they should. I think we could learn a lot from the relationship of MI5 and MI6 to each other, and from the relationship of both to the UK foreign service.

And the FBI uses its international division and the CIA uses its domestic division to illegally spy on Americans.
03-19-2018 12:22 PM
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RE: Bueller has been botching investigations since the Anthrax Investigations
Despite the amount of money I made in OT during the anthrax scare that's still a very dark time for me. Lot's of sleepless nights for this hazmat tech between running calls in our jurisdiction and mutual aid to nearby less equipped counties and worrying about accidental exposure. Getting scared to death when a pimple pops up on your forehead from being in a Level A hazmat suit so much, then the constant worrying until the test results come back. Don't miss that crap a bit.
03-19-2018 12:30 PM
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